People in the area rated their happiness levels at an average of 7.3 out of 10 in 2015/16. In comparison, people in Liverpool were the least happy, giving an average rating of 7.1 out of 10.

Knowsley has seen the biggest improvement in happiness levels, up from 7.1 in 2014/15 to 7.2, followed by Liverpool, up from 7, while Wirral, down from 7.31 to 7.25, has seen the biggest drop.

One in seven people in Liverpool (13.9%) and St Helens (13.9%) rated their happiness level as between 0 and 4 out of 10 when asked, some of the highest proportions of people giving a low score in the UK.

Eilean Siar in Scotland is the place where people gave the highest score to the question, how happy were you yesterday?, according to the Government’s wellbeing survey.

Respondents rated their average happiness as 8.2 out of 10 in 2015/16, up from 8.1 in 2014/15, meaning the area overtakes Fermanagh and Omagh in Northern Ireland, which was the happiest place for two years running between in 2013/15, as the happiest place in the UK.

Across the UK, average ratings across the four measures of personal well-being in the financial year ending 2016 were: 7.7 out of 10 for life satisfaction, 7.8 out of 10 for feeling that what you do in life is worthwhile, 7.5 out of 10 for happiness yesterday and 2.9 out of 10 for anxiety yesterday.

Reported personal well-being had improved every year since the financial year ending 2012, when data was first collected; however, the financial year ending 2016 saw the first instance where there has not been an annual improvement across all of the measures.

Life satisfaction is the only measure of personal well-being which has increased in the UK.

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Liverpool v Wirral

Those living in London reported lower average ratings of life satisfaction, anxiety and feeling things in life are worthwhile compared with UK overall.

Although women reported higher life satisfaction and worthwhile levels when compared with men, they also reported higher levels of anxiety

Dawn Snape, Quality of Life, Office for National Statistics, said: “We have seen personal well-being improving on a UK-wide basis over the past five years. But today’s data paints a richer picture, enabling people to explore what’s been happening in their local area.

“This will help individuals, communities and local authorities to look at well-being locally alongside other traditional measures of progress.”